Efforts to determine whether an innocent man was executed by the state of Texas came to a halt today when an appeals court ruled that the judge conducting the inquiry acted improperly.

The Texas Third Court of Appeals ruled that Travis County Judge Charles Baird should have responded to a prosecutor's petition that he recuse himself from the court of inquiry or refer the question of jurisdiction to a higher judge.

Today's ruling came in the case of Cameron Todd Willingham, a Corsicana auto mechanic executed six years ago after being convicted of killing his three young children in a deliberately set house fire. Innocence Project lawyers for his mother and cousin sought a court of inquiry and a declaration that Willingham wrongfully had been convicted.

The Third Court said that instead of acting on Navarro County District Attorney L. Lowell Thompson's petition for recusal, Baird determined the prosecutor had no standing in the case and, therefore, could not challenge his jurisdiction.

In mid-October, Baird began hearing testimony from fire experts critical of arson investigations that led to Willingham's conviction. Innocence Project lawyers told the appeals court that the session was a pre-court of inquiry hearing to determine whether a further inquiry was warranted. Such a preliminary hearing is mandated by state law.

Third Court justices, however, said the purpose of the hearing — preliminary or, in fact, a court of inquiry — was unclear.

The question of the quality of state and local arson investigations in the December 1991 Corsciana fire also is being considered by the Texas Forensic Science Commission. That group will hear testimony from fire experts at a Jan. 7 meeting in Austin.